Theoretical Foundations of the Web: Cognition, Communication, and Co-Operation. Towards an Understanding of Web 0, 0, 0

44
2. Three Notions of Sociality for the Analysis of Social Software 
By reviewing definitions of Web 2.0 and Social Software, we found out that these two terms are in 
most cases used interchangeably and that there are different understandings and concepts of what is 
termed social that are underlying these attempts. We will outline these notions in this chapter and work 
out our own understanding, which will differentiate between Social Software and Web 1.0, 2.0, 3.0, in 
section 3.
2.1. A Structure-Based View of Sociality 
The first understanding of Social Software is based on the Durkheimian notion of the social: All 
software is social in the sense that it is a product of social processes. It is produced by humans in social 
relations. It objectifies knowledge that is produced in society, and it is applied and used in social 
systems. Applying Durkheim’s notion of social facts to software means that all software applications 
are social. They are fixed and objectified social structures. Also if a user sits in front of a screen alone 
and browses information on the World Wide Web, s/he engages in sociality, because, according to 
Durkheim, the social facts the user is confronted with on the WWW have an existence of their own, 
independent of individual manifestations. Web technologies and Web contents therefore are social 
facts. “A social fact is every way of acting, fixed or not, capable of exerting on the individual an 
external constraint; or: which is general over the whole of a given society whilst having an existence of 
its own, independent of its individual manifestation” [5]. Based on this Durkheimian understanding of 
the social, Rainer Dringenberg [6] argues that the Web is a social fact because it is a structure that is 
cognized, internalized and about which many people interact in everyday life.
Martin Rost [7] argues 
that computer networks are social facts, because they are types of social functions: a social reality sui 
generis, that has functions in and shapes society. Once created, they would fulfill certain specific 
functions, just like other subsystems of society. Dourish [8] argues that all digital systems – computer 
hardware, software, periphery, the Internet, etc. – are social in the sense that they objectify human 
intentions, goals, interests, and understandings, i.e., they are social facts defined by human actors and 
they influence the behaviour of others. He says that these artefacts are based on “commonly held social 
understandings” [8]. 
For Durkheim, social facts are “existing outside the consciousness of the individual”, “penetrate us 
by imposing themselves upon us”; they are crystallized and objectified; they are “beliefs, tendencies 
and practices of the group taken collectively” [5]. If we take together the views by Dringenberg, Rost, 
and Dourish, then they tell us that technological artefacts such as computers or computer networks 
reflect certain common interpretations of the world of certain groups and by using technologies these 
meanings shape our thinking and action. Durkheim mentioned moral rules, aphorisms, popular 
sayings, articles of faith, standards of taste, laws, and the financial system as examples of social facts. 
He did not mention technology. Nonetheless his notion can also be applied to technologies. One can 
understand the approach of the Social Construction of Technology (SCOT) as being implicitly 
Durkheimian. Pinch and Bijker [9] argue that technologies are socially constructed, their design is a 
manifestation of how groups interpret the social world, which problems they see, and which solutions 
to these problems they consider adequate. “Meanings can get embedded in new artefacts” [10]. 

---